


Saint Fuckin' Gandhi

by QueerOnTilMorning



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - No Pennywise (IT), Broken Hearts Club AU, Eventual Smut, F/F, F/M, Georgie Denbrough Is Alive and Also A Woman and ALSO Kind of a Fuckboy, M/M, Romantic Comedy, Slow Burn, as slow as I can stand, or like
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-24
Updated: 2020-04-24
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:15:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23825911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueerOnTilMorning/pseuds/QueerOnTilMorning
Summary: Beverly Marsh says something that makes Richie Tozier rethink his relationships and take a break from casual sex. Unfortunately--or fortunately?--that's right when he meets the newly-out, newly-divorced, and extremely irritating Eddie Kaspbrak.This is a Broken Hearts Club AU I've been trying not to write for weeks, but I couldn't fight it anymore. Richie is Dennis, Eddie is Kevin, Ben is Taylor, and everyone else is sort of a mishmash of the other characters.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 8
Kudos: 23





	Saint Fuckin' Gandhi

"Holy shit," said Bev. "How are your parties always a convention of the hottest guys in LA?"

"Because everyone knows I spring for the good booze," Richie said, grinning.

"Which one's yours?" she asked, elbowing him as she surveyed the crowded living room.

Richie snorted. "My dear Miss Marsh, it is entirely too early in the evening for me to endorse a single candidate. We shall see where the party takes us."

"C'mon," she said, "you don't have a favorite? It's your birthday, who are you wishing for?"

"There are any number of candles here I'd be very happy to blow out," Richie answered.

He expected Bev to roll her eyes, but instead she smiled. "Well, if you're really considering all bids, maybe you won't be mad that I invited somebody."

"Mad?" He gestured to the swarm of bodies currently occupying his (reasonably spacious, not that he was bragging) house. "I don't know half these motherfuckers. Bring whoever you want. Who's the mystery guest?" He started making his way through the press of people toward the kitchen, pulling Beverly along by the hand.

"There's this new guy in my class," she explained. Bev was an aspiring designer, but to supplement her scant internship wages she also taught kickboxing and self-defense at a local gym. "Super cute in this really tightly wound way, just moved to town. He needs to meet people, so I invited him."

"Ah." Richie mixed a martini--the only marketable skill he'd gleaned from his year and a half of college--and handed it to Bev. "So is this super cute guy a party favor for me or for you?"

"For you, dipshit!" She smacks him lightly on the arm. "He's gay. Plus, Audra is on her way here right now."

"Oh, right.” He mentally thumbed through the list of Bev’s Significant Others. Was Audra the one she met at karaoke? “I’m excited to--”

“He’s heeeere,” said a voice in his ear, mimicking the kid from the original  _ Poltergeist, _ though not as well as Richie could have. He turned his head to see Stan grinning up at him.

“He, who?” Richie asked.

“Street Fighter Guy,” Stan said. “From that one bar.”

“Holy shit, really?” The guy in the vintage Street Fighter t-shirt had been  _ smoking _ hot, and he and Richie made out a little on the dance floor, but he’d left with his friends before Richie had a chance to seal the deal. He’d been hoping to run into him ever since, but he’d never expected the dude to show up at his  _ house. _

“Ooh, do we have a new frontrunner?” Bev teased.

“How did he even know it was my birthday?”

“I don’t know,” Stan said. “I think maybe he’s friends with Ben. There’s a whole group of those guys here.”

That made sense. Everyone knew about Richie’s extreme open-door policy for house parties, so his friends brought their friends, who brought their friends, and so on. Ben wasn’t quite inner circle yet, but he was around a lot and Richie liked him. Despite being unfortunately straight, the guy was so charming and earnest you couldn’t help opening up to him.

“Which one is Ben?” Bev asked.

“Georgie’s boyfriend,” Stan said.

“Georgie has a boyfriend?” Bev, already at the point of tipsiness where she expressed surprise through physical violence, shoved Richie’s shoulder. “Why didn’t I know that?”

Richie shrugged. The real reason, which they all took pains not to mention, was that Georgiana Denbrough didn’t  _ like  _ Bev, and avoided her whenever possible. The two women had been friendly acquaintances before Bev dated Georgie’s brother, Bill. In typical Bev fashion, she’d crushed his heart without even noticing, and Georgie, out of sisterly loyalty, had never forgiven her.

“Where is Georgie, now that you mention it?” Stan said, looking around. “For that matter, where’s Bill?”

“Bill, at a party? Whatever made such a strange thought cross your mind, Staniel?”

Stan gave him a wry look. “Uh, he fucking lives here.”

“Coulda fooled me, with how often I see the guy,” Richie said. “I think he’s in his room.”

“Oh my God,” Bev said, “we have to go rescue him from himself!”

Knowing Beverly was at least twenty percent of the reason Bill was keeping his distance, Richie grabbed her wrist and steered her toward the living room instead. “Nahh, we’ll just party extra hard in his memory.”

Ben and his friends were dancing with abandon as Richie, Bev, and Stan joined them. "Happy birthday, buddy!" Ben yelled in Richie's ear, wrapping him in an exuberant hug, which Richie was more than happy to accept. He might have been straight and taken, but Ben was cute as _ fuck,  _ in a heavyset, bearded, lumberjack-y kind of way.

"Where's your lovely lady?" Richie asked, not that Georgie's absence was surprising. Being fashionably late, or fashionably forgetting to show up at all, was kind of her thing.

"I don't know, I think she must have gotten stuck at work late," Ben said. "She's not answering my texts, but I'm sure she'll be here soon." He gestured to another man standing nearby, noncommittally quasi-dancing. "This is my friend Mike."

"Oh, hi, Mike," Richie said, looking him up and down. He was tall, taller than Richie, and muscular, with a neat little beard. "Do you work at the hospital?"

Mike's eyebrows furrowed. "No, at the library--why?"

"Because  _ hello, nurse. _ " Richie leered theatrically, but Mike just kept looking confused. Richie soldiered on. "How did you and Benjamin meet? Were you next to each other on the assembly line at the hot dude factory?"

"Oh, for  _ fuck's-- _ " Stan grabbed Richie and dragged him away. "So sorry, he was just leaving," he said over his shoulder.

As they walked away, Richie heard Mike say, "I thought this was his party?"

"Smoke?" Bev asked, and Richie followed her out to the front porch. There were only a few people out here, a circle of stylish-looking gay guys at least ten years Richie's junior, passing around a joint. As Richie lit the cigarette he bummed off Beverly, she checked her phone.

"Oh, good," she said. "Audra is on her way. And Eddie's… wow, he sent me a Google map. He'll be here in twelve minutes."

"What's this?" Richie asked. "Do you have two dates tonight? I can help you keep them from meeting each other!"

"No, dumbass," she said.

"Aw." Richie pouted. "That would have been a great birthday present. You know how I love hijinks."

"Eddie's the guy I told you about," she said. "From my class."

"Oh, right," he nodded. "And which one's Audra?"

"My  _ girlfriend," _ she said, as though it was a very stupid question.

"Right. The girlfriend from the art gallery?"

"No, that was like three months ago. Audra is an actress, and she works at that coffee shop Stan likes."

"How am I supposed to keep the details straight?" he said. "There's like a thousand of 'em." He'd had a beer when he came out here, hadn't he? Where was his beer?

"That's cute coming from you," she said, her eyes narrowing.

"Entirely different situations," Richie said. Abandoning the search for his beer, he found a fresh one in the cooler by the door. He gestured with it for emphasis as he said, "I am a slut."

"Woohoo!" cheered one of the stoners, a guy with a hipster beard.

"You, on the other hand," he went on, pointing his beer bottle at Bev, "are a serial monogamist, which is a slut in denial."

"That's a fucked-up--"

"No, look, we both fuck around, okay? I'm just more honest about it. I don't introduce you to guys I'm never going to see again. But you bring some new lady or dude over here every other week, and act like you've found the real thing."

"What exactly is wrong with that?" Beverly said. He knew he was pissing her off, but he was about 40% drunk in addition to being 100% Richie "Trashmouth" Tozier, and knowing when to quit was not really in his wheelhouse.

"It's fine to admit you just like some strange, babe," he said. "You don't have to pretend to fall in love with every person you want to see naked."

He kind of expected her to smack him again, or at least cuss him out, but instead she smiled, a little sadly. "Oh, Rich," she said. "Has it never even occurred to you that I might actually like the people I date?"

Richie shrugged.

"I'm not pretending to care about them," Bev said. "Yeah, I like sex, but that's not my only goal. I'm actually trying to find something real."

"One Instagram model at a time?" he snarked. Bev shook her head.

"This is just making me feel bad for you, honey," she said. "You don't bother to get to know people. You can call that being honest if you want, but you're missing out on a lot. Maybe you've already met your soulmate, and you didn't even know it because you never said more than two sentences to him."

_ Yeah, right, _ he thought. As if Richie opening his heart to one of his hookups would result in the guy sticking around _ longer, _ instead of running for the door.

But if he said that to Bev, she'd be on the scent of vulnerability like a very well-dressed bloodhound. Richie flashed a cheesy grin. "But  _ you're _ my soulmate, Beverly."

She rolled her eyes, but before she said anything else, a car was pulling up in front of Richie's house. It was… fuck if Richie knew anything about cars, but it was flashy and bright red and looked fast. It parallel parked flawlessly on the first try. "Nice ride," Richie said to Bev.

The guy who got out of the car looked the absolute opposite of fast and flashy. He wore jeans and a gray hoodie, dark hair pushed back from an angular face. His eyes were  _ huge. _

"Nice ride," Richie said again, pitching his voice lower.

"Eddie!" Bev yelled. "Richie likes your car."

Car Guy picks up the pace and trots up Richie's front walk. "Hey, yeah, this is your house? Thanks for having me." His voice is clipped, vaguely East Coast. "You into cars?"

"He _ loves _ cars," Beverly said, grinning smugly at Richie.

When would Bev learn, Richie wondered, that trying to put him on the spot only led to more discomfort for everyone else? "Shit yeah, dude," he said. "That's a sexy little midlife crisis you're having. Did they throw in the divorce papers for free?"

Those huge eyes got even bigger. "First of all, bro, fuck you." Well, that was fair. "Second of all, did your fucking hairline divorce you, or is it just hiding from your ugly-ass shirt?"

Beverly shrieked with laughter. Richie gaped at her. Traitor! "Eddie, I'm keeping you," she said. "Sorry about Richie. He was cursed by a powerful wizard and now he can only speak absolute bullshit. Want to come inside and drink a bunch of his expensive liquor?"

Car Guy shot Richie another scowl, then nodded to Bev. She stubbed out her cigarette and led the way inside, gesturing not at all subtly for Richie to stay on the porch. He was happy to oblige. As the stoner circle's conversation buzzed around him, he stretched out his legs and blew smoke rings at the stars.

After a minute, his phone buzzed with a text from Bev:  _ Eddie just got divorced for real, u fuckin asshole _

**what,** he replied.  **ur mad@ me for being correct now???**

Before she could respond, Richie heard the door swinging open behind him. He tipped his head all the way back and saw, upside down, a pair of skinny jeans, a vintage-looking ringer t-shirt, and a profusion of silky blond curls. Street Fighter Guy. What was his real name again?

"Hey," said Richie, as suavely as possible with his head down between his shoulder blades.

"Hey," the guy said. He leaned against the porch railing. Richie lifted his head and half-turned; sitting down, his head was approximately level with the other man's fly, which was extremely fine with him. Fuck, he was just as hot as Richie remembered. Those legs went on forever.

"How's the party?" Richie asked.

"It's good," said Street Fighter Guy. His shirt rode up a little, revealing a bare inch of hipbone that Richie wanted to lick. "This is your house, right?"

"Yeah." Well, that was an opening if Richie had ever heard one. "You want the grand tour?"

"That'd be great." His voice was husky.

Richie took his time getting to his feet, dropping his cigarette into what remained of his beer. "I've seen you around, haven't I?" he asked, like it was just dawning on him. The guy smiled knowingly as Richie held the door open for him to go back inside.


End file.
